Various surgical procedures are routinely carried out intravascularly or intraluminally. For example, in the treatment of vascular disease, such as arteriosclerosis, it is a common practice to access the artery and insert an instrument (e.g., a balloon or other type of catheter) to carry out a procedure within the artery. Such procedures usually involve the percutaneous puncture of the artery so that an introducer (also referred to as an introducer sheath or an insertion sheath) may be placed in the artery and thereafter instruments (e.g., catheters) may pass through the introducer to an operative position within the patient.
The introducer is typically designed to penetrate the skin and wall of a blood vessel and be positioned within the patient so that surgical implements and medical devices may be advanced and withdrawn through the introducer. In this way, even when multiple surgical implements and medical devices are used in a single procedure, there is a single placement of the introducer through the skin and vessel wall.
Introducers may include valves that prevent back flow of blood through the introducer and introduction of air into the introducer and vessel, while permitting advancement of the surgical implements and medical devices to the vessel. Introducer valves are typically categorized as passive or active. A passive valve generally relies on the deformation of a resilient sealing member by an implement or medical device that is inserted through the valve to form the desired fluid-tight seal. An active valve typically includes a mechanism that moves a sealing member into contact with the implement or medical device.